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STRATHAM, N.H. (CBS) – How a student managed to bring a loaded gun in his backpack to school is raising questions at Cooperative Middle School in Stratham, New Hampshire.

“I was very worried,” said parent Heidi Bunnell. “It’s every parent’s nightmare that something like that would happen at school and luckily nothing worse happened.”

School administrators have called a special meeting for Thursday night following concerns over how last week’s incident was handled.

Among the concerns is why the principal left the building as word spread about a possible gun in school.

“I think the principal followed all processes and protocols, delegated to a couple of very, very capable assistant principals, one of whom was a former police officer,” said Superintendent Mike Morgan. “And the principal chose to go to another meeting.”

Parents are also upset that they found out about the incident from the media. Morgan acknowledges phone alerts to parents should have been made.

“The information went to the press, the press circulated it doing some tweets,” said Morgan. “It really probably accelerated the process for parents by about probably 20 or 30 minutes.”

Parent Sandy Reed said she will attend the forum.

“I think it’s a good opportunity for the school to examine their protocols,” said Reed. “I think there were holes. For example, I dropped off my daughter during the lockdown, didn’t know there was a lockdown, and she went into school during the lockdown.”